Transcript Celebrating Differences - Culture and Individual Diversity LET II

Celebrating Differences Culture and Individual Diversity
LET II
Introduction
• Synergy is when you and your team members
cooperate together and create better results than
they could get working alone. Each individual is
unique and you must value that uniqueness, just
like Captain Kirk and his crew did. Real synergy
is celebrating differences, teamwork, openmindedness and finding new and better ways of
doing things.
Historical Information
• On July 26, 1948, President Harry S. Truman
signed Executive Order 9981. This order called
for the integration of the armed forces and an
end to discrimination against soldiers because of
race, color, or creed.
• Although the Army completed its desegregation
in the 1950s, the assignment of whites and
members of minority groups to the same units did
not ensure total equality, racial harmony, or a
fully integrated Army.
Historical Information
• The Army, like society at large, began to address
the questions and challenges of the race issue
seriously in the 1960s.
Values and Attitudes
• Values and attitudes are very important to the
daily functioning of our lives. They help to form
the basis of how we see ourselves as individuals,
how we see others, and how we interpret the
world in general.
Values and Attitudes
• Some may have been due to religious or cultural
backgrounds; others may have stemmed from
racial or ethic backgrounds.
• In your role as a leader, you will also be a
counselor and a helper. In order to communicate
well with others, it will be necessary for you to
understand the dynamics involved with the value
and attitude differences that occur within us, and
that can come between us.
Values and Attitudes
• As a society, we are daily involved with attitudes
and behavior and we must understand how one
affects the other.
My attitudes affect my behavior.
My behavior affects your attitudes.
Your attitudes affect your behavior.
Your behavior affects my attitudes.
Values and Attitudes
• Attitudes can have positive or negative
implications. Although they can help people to
make sense out of their life experiences, we, as
individuals, cannot change them easily.
Self-Image/Self-Concept
• As a leader, you will constantly be dealing with
people.
• The most important single factor affecting
people’s communication with others is their selfconcept - how they see themselves and their
situations.
Self-Image/Self-Concept
• Self-concept is the picture we have of ourselves as
seen through our own thoughts, development,
perceptions, and feelings.
• Development is the way we feel about ourselves,
which has a direct relationship to our
upbringing; it includes values and attitudes.
• Perception refers to the interpretation and the
amount of “emotional charge” attributed to past
events and present situations.
Self-Image/Self-Concept
• Feelings refer to the positive or negative, good or
bad, indifference or intensity, of emotions or
interpretation of oneself.
• Needs Fulfillment/Emotional Development. Your
personal, psychological, emotional, and physical
needs define your self-concept.
• Heritage. As soon as you came into this world,
society classified you in terms of:
Category
Gender
Race
Nationality
Religion
Family status
Legal status
Environment
Physical status
Parentage
Examples
Male, female
White, Black, etc.
American, German, etc.
Catholic, Jewish, etc.
Lower, Middle Class, etc.
Legitimate, illegitimate
From country, ghetto, etc.
Cute/ugly baby
Married, single, divorced
Prejudice and Discrimination
• We live in America — the most democratic (and
free) country in the world!
• Why, then, is there still prejudice and
discrimination in this land of opportunity?
Positive Self-Image
Negative Self-Image
Love of self/others
Hate self and others
Be excited about
reaching out for the
adventure of life
Hide from life and
its miseries
Experience serenity,
joy, hope, and trust
Experience anxiety,
despair, distrust, and
anger
Develop your
intelligence
Be blind to your
potential
Decisive, assertive
Indecisive, defensive,
aggressive
Positive Self-Image
Negative Self-Image
Enjoy your physical
abilities
Deny or exaggerate
physical abilities
Create
Destroy
Be tolerant, accepting
Bigoted, prejudiced
Self-actualize
Suicidal/homicidal
Open
Closed
Trusting
Hidden agendas
Assertive
Defensive
Prejudice
• Prejudice is defined as a feeling — favorable or
unfavorable — toward a person, thing, or group
that may or may not be based on actual
experience(s).
• Another factor that is closely related, if not
interwoven, with the norms, values, beliefs, and
attitudes is one’s culture. A culture is the total of
the learned behaviors of a group of people that
are generally considered to be the tradition of
that people and are transmitted from generation
to generation.
Discrimination
• Discrimination is defined as the actions or
practices carried out by members of dominant
groups, or their representatives, that have a
differential and harmful impact on members of
subordinate groups.
• Causes for discrimination include:
• Group Size. This may be the simplest explanation
for discriminatory behavior among dominant
group members.
Discrimination
• Social Distance. The attempt by a dominate
group to keep a distance between it and a
subordinate group by limiting access and
intimacy.
• Competition. It always serves the dominant
group’s best interests to limit competition with a
subordinate group, from competing for scarce
economic resources to other forms such as
athletic competition.
• Status Consciousness. Minority groups occupy a
generally low status in American society.
Stereotyping
• A stereotype, whether favorable or unfavorable,
is an exaggerated belief associated with a
category.
Racial Tension
• Insensitive leadership.
• Racial prejudice and discrimination.
• Unfair administration of rewards and
punishment, promotions, and duties.
• Limited recognition and awareness of minorities.
How Leaders Can Create Change
• Overcome prejudices by learning the facts and
applying sound reasoning processes.
• Be prepared to detect and evaluate warning signs
of possible unrest that may stem from racial
issues in units and take immediate action to
eliminate the causes.
• Know all you can about your subordinates —
their values, attitudes, how they came to be the
way they are, and what they want to be.
• Promote mutual understanding through effective
communication.
How Leaders Can Create Change
• Give fair and impartial treatment to all.
How to Lessen Prejudices
• Make contacts with people on an equal status and
under a spirit of cooperation.
• Share goals.
• Have people work on common problems.
• Create appropriate educational activities.
• Sanction contacts by law.
How to Lessen
Adverse Perceptions and Stereotypes
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Accept differences.
Listen actively.
Provide feedback.
Share behaviors/feelings.
Encourage feedback.
Use inclusionary language. Use terms such as
“we” and “us;” do not use “they,” “he,” or “she.”
Plus, avoid using “isms.”
• Avoid stereotypes.
How You Can Help to Create Change From a
Personal Level
• There are three ways that you personally can
create change.
• The most readily available and mildest tactic for
change is dialogue. This tactic is particularly
effective to change people who are on the fence,
who need support for new thought, or who are
seriously trying to make sense out of their
deepest commitments.
How You Can Help to Create Change From a
Personal Level
• A second tactic designed to be stronger than
dialogue is confrontation. This involves using the
skills of effective feedback and active listening in
a non-threatening way.
• The third tactic is education and understanding.